Currently Sophia and I are searching through the Cybernetics Department. Sneaking inside was surprisingly easy and nothing of note happened. Searching through the various trash over the desks I find a key that screams secret to me. I stuff it into a pocket and move on. I work my way over to the supply closet they have.

"You won't find anything in there." I suddenly hear a voice behind me and I swing around in case I need to fight. Though I wonder why my Danger Sense didn't react.

Ready to strike I then see my friend Natalie staring right at me, my fist, then back to me.

"Nice to see your reflexes are on point. But I am not here to stop you." Hearing her calm voice I put down my fist. "Now you both don't think you could just walk into a robotics institution and not set off any kind of security system."

"Uhh…" Sophia and I voice at the same time.

"I thought so. Luckily for you, I answered the alarm first and disabled it, but you really need to work on stealth, if you have any." Natalie walks over to a set of drawers. She then opens one that seems to be named 'churros' and pulls out a metal axle of some kind with a small hole in the middle.

"Either of you wouldn't have happened to carry magnesium on you?" Natalie then asks us swinging the axle in our direction as she talks.

"I have some for emergencies, but you can have some." Sophia hands Natalie a small ingot that she got from somewhere, but I assume it's some kind of inter-dimensional storage.

"Thank you." Natalie walks over to a nearby table and grabs a random dish and a steak knife. She then chips the magnesium into little bits, and moves the bits into the center of the axle. Sophia and I share glances throughout this entire process and I am utterly confused to how she seems to know what she is doing.

"Hey, uh, Natalie what are you doing?" I ask her.

"Alice, I am creating the metal cigarette. You see, while this department may have been heavily defunded, traces of a past remain. In other words, I am creating the key to access their den where they usually hide away. Their man-cave so to speak." After her explanation she moves over to the door and shoves the axle into a small grove in it.

"Now if you light this the trapdoor will open. If you are looking for secrets, then you might have better luck in their home base. Do either of you have the ability to create fire?"

"I don't."

"Neither do I," Sophia and I respond in turn.

"…Space Weaver, why do you carry magnesium if you cannot light it?" Natalie asks. Does Sophia not realize that she needs some kind of heat to light the flame?

"There are different ways to light magnesium." Sophia states while grabbing the cigarette. She transforms her hand into a claw which I assume is her spider form giving an exo-skeleton and strikes the magnesium, creating sparks and lighting it. After a few seconds a hidden passage opens showing a staircase leading downwards.

"Right. Well, good night," Natalie promptly states and leaves before we could ask her any questions.

"Let's go." Sophia grabs my shoulder and we head down the dark stairs. The stairs on the upper steps were made of rotting wood but as we head down the stairs become brick and sturdy.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Down at the bottom of the stairs we see a damp room that seems to be currently used as storage but it looks like it used to be an underground bar from the furniture stacked against one of the walls.

*Crackle*

At the sudden noise I jump back a bit and look at the source. I see Sophia struggling to get her hand out of a wooden crate that I think she might have punched through.

"Damn it. Welp. Alice, can you give me a hand?" Sophia looks over at me with what I assume is a pleading expression so I walk over and start to pull. We make no progress for over five minutes. I think I need to break the rest of the crate.

"Ok Space Weaver I have an idea."

"What is it?"

"We need to break the crate. Now I want you to stay still while I strike."

Sophia gives me a nod of affirmation and sets her hand on a ledge of crates. I received a skill for Earth Magic a bit ago so this might as well be the best opportunity to use some application of it.

Looking within myself I find my mana in its usually wispy state but we I activate my Earth Magic any of the slippery stuff suddenly becomes coarse and rough. In this form I don't have to actually push the stuff and can actually just grab the stuff and drag it wherever I want. This is easier said than done though as this style of mana is incredibly heavy but I get it over to my hands in the end.

I shove the stuff into where my hands are and open my eyes. I glance at my hands to see giant rock fists around my hands. When I open and clench my hands the rock moves as well. This seems to be a tough move but I can feel my arms trembling at the weight and my mana rapidly depleting as well. I raise my fist and with the last of my strength I let it drop.

*Crash*

The fist falls apart as I collapse from having a significant portion of my mana drained. Sophia kneels down next to me and I can feel a warm, comforting aura flow over me. Glancing over I see a soft, green light emit from her hands and then I see a notification.

[ Through exemplary actions you have unlocked the skill: Rock Hand(Minimum, Active) ]

[ Rock Hand - A basic melee spell for those that use Earth Magic. This spell uses a random assortment of minerals with a hardness of 4 to create a fist around the user's hand. Cost: 5mp per sec ]

"Oh. Yay, my first magic attack." I said while gasping for air and a general feeling of exhaustion.

"Oh, congratulations. What is it? I assume Rock Hand." Sophia replies and helps me stand up. There is an awkward air as she continues making me feel better with the light from her hands. We just stand in silence for a few moments.

"Thanks, but, uh, what are you doing there with your hands?" I ask gesturing to the obvious light. Whatever this is doing is making me really calm.

"Oh, this? This is just a healing spell keyed towards healing exhaustion, both physical and mental. I just don't really have much use for this spell as it can't heal actual wounds, but it works great for situations like this." I soon feel completely refreshed, and after telling Sophia that I feel better, we look at the crate that was violently smashed apart.

"What is it?" I ask. The crate seems to contain metal bottles containing something but it is sealed tight. I want to try forcing it open, but my Danger Sense is telling me not to.

"If my suspicions are right I want you to stay there and don't touch any of these containers." She opens a portal and drops all of the containers in. I make a confused expression and Sophia notices. "Spacial storage," she replies to the unasked question.

We find a large, bulkhead door covered by crates and when Sophia opens the handle we find another corridor. At the end of said corridor we find a fork in the road. "Huh. So, left or right?" I ask Sophia.

Her face seems to be in thought. "What do you think Silvernight?" What? Why does she want me to choose? Not getting any reaction from her I stand between the options. I focus on the two, trying to find what Sophia wants me to do, and fail to figure out any outcome. In silence for an undetermined amount of time, I get a sense of danger from the right.

[ Through repeated actions skill: Danger Sense(Minor, Passive) has ranked up to Danger Sense(Medium, Passive) ]

"I have a feeling of danger from the right." I say at last.

"So do I. We are going that way. There might be guards down there."

Down the right path is nothing new as it was identical to the previous corridor.

"Unknown…entities…detected…analyzing…threat…level…threat…detected…eliminating." Suddenly a huge man came around a corner and glared at us. He, or maybe it, had pipes and tubes running all over its body, metal plate on its face and a glowing crystal where the left eye should be. Its left arm looked mostly human but the entire right arm was metal. The whole thing clocked in at about 7 feet and was quite fast for its size as it was now chasing us back down the hall.

"What do we do, Space Weaver?" But she was gone.